Messages - CoupDeGlace

Keep watching the main page of the law school website... I think it's a pretty safe bet we'll be emailed regarding Fay in the next day or so, because I'm sure they've gotten some inquiries by now as to whether or not this is going to affect the banquet on Wednesday. I think they're probably going to wait and see where in Florida the storm actually lands. It looks like if it goes as planned it'll come directly or close to Gainesville, but by then it'll only be a tropical storm. Still, I can't imagine them holding a banquet around that kind of weather.

Your gator1 id will be used for the "facebook" of all incoming first years, and it will also be used for the journal selections (ie, law review posts a list of its new members with pictures). It's worth trying a couple times to take a good photo

Re the nutshell book, I read parts of it before law school, but don't remember it being very helpful. I strongly recommend getting to maybe, but don't worry about reading it until you've started your first semester. I personally didn't feel like the reading load during the start of 1L was so cumbersome that I didn't have spare time to go to football games, do "fun" reading, etc.

So if someone accidentally lost my Gator1 card... do they just reissue you one using the same pic or do you get to take a new picture?

And in the event that they did take a new picture, wouldn't the original one be the one used by the law school anyway?

I don't think my picture's that bad... the sad thing is it's the best out of 2 takes... I was too proud to ask for another one. I really have a feeling their high quality cameras can only do so much...

Actually, Egyptian Arabic is probably the best to study. There is no "standard Arabic" so every country had their own dialect. Egypt has the advantage of being the pop movie/music center of the Arabic world. They use a Cairo dialect on Al Jazeera and the other international channels. If you want to impress Arabs more than speak with them study classical Arabic (aka Koranic Arabic), since that is what Arabic speakers think of as Standard Arabic; unfortunately no one can SPEAK Classical Arabic...

As for the Rosetta Stone software, I've never used it, but if your library offers it for free, it is certainly worth a try. It does seem to sell well so some people must like it. The key really is to realize that everyone likes different things in a language program so RS might be a good program, just not for you

I would assume that in a professional setting, MSA would be fine, plus whatever variant needed for wherever it is you intend to practice. Egyptian Arabic is considered one of the more widespread variants of Arabic because of the popularity of Egyptian media.

The diglossic nature of Arabic kind of makes it necessary to view it as learning two or more languages. That's kind of what put me off learning it, it just was too much effort for me right now.

To answer the question as to what languages are the most important, it all depends on where you intend to practice, what kind of law you want to practice... simply put, whatever the language(s) your future clients will speak will be important. I definitely don't think it would hurt to know Spanish in the US, but there's also so many bilingual native Spanish speakers that it's not going to really make you stand out.

If you're looking to practice or maintain a language during law school, simple ways are to take advantage of online media... Like for German, Deutsche Welle has a lot of online resources for foreign students of German; there's printed media, news podcasts... sometimes you might try to find what music is popular in the country/countries where the language is spoken and download those... I usually check out the Top 100 downloads on iTunes Germany/Italy/etc. These are all easy ways to improve and not really feel like you're "studying."

And if you have the time, or by some luck you have any native speakers in your school's LLM program, you might take advantage of that. A lot of universities also have language partner programs, where they can match you to an exchange student there studying English that speaks whatever your target language is. It might be a nice way to make friends from outside the law circle... Just some ideas.

I also bought the Nutshell book... I've read parts of it, but I've been focused more on doing pleasure reading than law school stuff right now. In a week or so I'll probably devote a bit more attention to that and Getting to Maybe. That's all I bought. The Study and Practice of Law in a Nutshell book really is more reassuring than anything. And personally, that's fine by me, because with the volume of books on the market that are anything but, I think it's nice to at least have some remnant of confidence when embarking on the long road of law school studies.

I'm glad someone else asked about the service project, I was also curious as to what sort of things we would wind up doing. I really don't mind having to do something like community service. I assume it's to make people get to know each other better... I don't know. I'm sure there'll be a bunch of people who won't want to be there, but whatever, it's only a few hours. As long as I'm not assigned to roadside cleanup during a day in which there's a torrential downpour...

I was initially surprised we have to pay $125 for Orientation, but even undergrads have to pay for Preview... I was a member of the last entering year at USF that didn't have mandatory overnight orientation, so I didn't pay anything.

BTW are they going to use our Gator1 picture for one of those photo collages of all the entering members of the Class of 2011? Because it's bad enough that those pics have to go into a viewbook... I'd really prefer if they would ask us to submit a more flattering picture (perhaps one in which I don't look stoned)

I was just in San Francisco last week... I of course went by Hastings, even though I won't be going there this fall (I'm staying in Florida) I didn't think the Tenderloin was that bad... I guess I imagined worse. I'm surrounded by seedier areas here in Tampa. It may be a very different story at night, I'm sure (I was there in broad daylight) but then, that's a city for you.

I'm probably one of very few people that go by and took a bunch of pics of a law school... but I did.

I'd imagine living in the Tower would be pretty cool... you'll definitely get some great views of the city up there.

I visited Levin last November with some friends who were also applying to law school... we sat in on Harrison's Contracts class on a Friday morning and then had a general tour and had Jake Henry answer some of our questions.

A friend of mine (who's also going to UF this fall) and I went up to visit our friend (rising 2L) back in April and he showed us around again. It was my second time, and so since I was decided on going to UF I payed more attention/was more excited since I knew this was where I was going to be come August. I like how I loved the whole campus the second time, while on the first visit I was a little intimidated by it.

I don't see a problem in going on a tour... I didn't get to make it to ASD (it was the week after I had visited our friend... and I also had spent the past 2 days on a thesis writing spree and was completely exhausted, so I spent that day at home resting) If you're up in Gainesville already, you might as well.

By the way, does anyone have any idea what's up with this proposed new courtroom building? Because it's mentioned on the Wikipedia page for Levin, and my friend also told us there were plans to build a new mock courtroom facility (because the current one is kind of old, at least the one I saw... I don't know how many there are)

I'll be getting my Florida Law tee shirt when I'm back up in Gainesville sometime within the next few weeks.

Did you guys get them at the main bookstore or the law bookstore? Because I saw them at the main bookstore in the Reitz Union, but I didn't know if they had different styles.

Mr. Two-Bits is awesome. You can find videos of him running around Florida Field on YouTube.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed for the lottery... we find out June 13. I'm not expecting to be selected, just so I don't get let down. But they'd pick me if they realized how much I want these tickets.

I said this in the PLS/LSC post... I own Law School Confidential, though I never found it particularly useful. Every person I discussed Miller's outlining method with said it was a waste of time.

I have Getting to Maybe, which I'll be going through, but that's all I plan to read that's law school related. The only thing I am concerned with is making sure I can hit the ground running come August, and so I'm just trying to enjoy my summer as much as possible so I'm rested up and ready to tackle the books in a couple of months.

Maybe one of the current students can fill me in, but what kind of stuff is covered at ILSP?